Powerlifting Australia At The Sydney Fitness Show

Powerlifting Australia At The Sydney Fitness Show

Sydney’s premiere fitness trade show hosted another stunning Powerlifting event, once again before a huge audience of sport aficionados rivaling that of last April’s Melbourne show. This was a double-header, with 12 international champions taking part in the Pacific Challenge and then 50 top Australians in the Matti Tikka contest.

Most thought Ray Williams’ world records set in Melbourne would never be topped on Australian soil but Jeza Upea of Nauru knew otherwise. Here Jeza took both of Ray’s world records with a monumental 413kg Squat and 978.5kg Total. Without doubt, this gives Jeza the unofficial title of Worlds Strongest Man and now the 2015 World Championships is the goal to make his dominance in the books once and for all.

If Jeza is the World’s Strongest Man who is the World’s Strongest Woman? Pound for pound it’s Kimberly Walford of the USA, who in Sydney stormed through 186kg Squat, 110kg Bench, an enormous 240kg Deadlift and 536kg Totalfor the best points score ever in Women’s Powerlifting.

And there was more. Another all-time-great Krzysztof Wierzbicki of Poland was ill, lost 5kg of bodyweight and had to push to get over the 93kg class he is World Champion in. Yet Krzysztof came through with a 105kg Deadlift World Record of 340.5kg. Then Chanel 7 asked him to do it again at 7am the next morning for a national TV audience! Krzystof, partially recovered, obliged with an easy 342.5kg.

Australians also came through with record performances of the national variety. 47kg Mary Macken set World age 50+ records, whilst Elizabeth Craven finished with a 361kg Total at 52kg. In the Australian contest, winners earned extravagant gems from Opal Magnate Matti Tikka, the man behind the name of the annual Matti Tikka Challenge.

Now, standby for 2015 when Powerlifting Australia will have big Powerlifting events at not just two but four city Fitness Expos all around Australia!